July 23, 2017 -
Boldness
This past month has been full high highs and low lows, but the Father in his goodness has shown Himself faithful to me and I am beyond grateful. Also, I know that the Father is working through your pr@yers and for that I cannot thank you enough.
Right now, we have some college volunteers giving up their summer to serve all the way across the world. Two of these volunteers are young women, who have been placed in a village. They have a translator and are tasked with living life on life with people and sharing the good news through stories. The village where they live is a place where our organization has done a lot of work, but really has not seen much fruit. However, this changed when these two young ladies arrived in the village. You see over the years, in our absence, the Father has been working in the lives of this village. He has been drawing them to Himself, and reminding them of the stories they learned so many years ago. People are hungry for the Word. People are contemplating big decisions. And a few are making the biggest decision of all! The Father gave me the opportunity to join these ladies a couple weekends this past month. The time was rich and we were able to so many conversations, even with the Musl!m leader of the village.
One weekend a lady, Mary*, came and said she wanted to follow the Son’s road. She explained she had heard the stories many years ago and she knew it was the truth. We were able to present the good news to her and she accepted. My heart was overjoyed that the Father let us be a part of her journey. However, her journey got a lot harder the next morning. You see the next morning was the last day of the fasting month for Musl!ms. On this day, everyone goes to the M0sque for pr@yer and teaching. It was also Sunday, and we had invited Mary* to go to chrch with us in a neighboring village. As everyone was getting ready to go to the m0sque that morning Mary* had a decision to make. I looked over to see her standing with the women of her village, I began to ask the Father to give her His courage. The courage to step out of the crowd and declare that she is now following the Son’s road. He was faithful and did just that!
We have seen a couple others in the village make this same decision and it is not without its costs. The persecution will be great and journey will hard, but He is worth it!
Requests
* Ask for courage and boldness for Mary* and the two other believers in her village
* Ask for motivation and encouragement for our summer volunteers they have one week left in country
* Ask for motivation for myself as I approach my next language evaluation, it will be the second week of August
I mentioned some low lows, I ask that you would ask the Father to remind why He has brought me here, especially on the hard days
*Name changed for privacy
